Welcome to BlogJart. If you aren't a nerd, you may not enjoy what you read. Expect to see a mix of topics including technology, sports and anything I think is extremely nifty (gifty).
I feel like I have some valid opinions and thoughts on the things I'm interested in; and this is where I will share them- along with other cool stuff. And things.

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Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Wireless Phone-to-Car Audio for $60

When in the car, It is always nice to eliminate clutter. While on a road trip I began thinking that there must be a better way to listen to Pandora than having the power and aux cable plugged into my phone at the same time. Well, this is a setup eliminates one of those cables, and is one that I use regularly. For this to work you must have an auxillary input on your car stereo. Most new cars include this. Most aftermarket stereos at least have it as an option (I had to get a 20$ cable to add an aux in to my Alpine unit).

The setup couldn't be more straight forward. The feature of the MW600 that makes this possible is the headphones use a standard 1/8" mini stereo jack for connectivity between the bluetooth reciever and headphones. You could even plug in your own headphones if you desire. But we will be using this jack to connect our bluetooth headset to the aux input of the car stereo.

The operation is what really makes this setup shine. Once paired to the MW600, your cell phone will automatically connect to it when it's in range. The MW600 will last about 4-5 days powered on, sitting in the glove box, automatically pairing itself to your phone as you get in and out of the car. In my truck (as shown below) the aux in is right on the front of the CD player, so I chose the adapter route. This saves greatly on cable clutter.

Ideally you would have a separate bluetooth earpiece for accepting calls. You can delegate the media and phone audio channels to separate bluetooth devices in the settings of most smartphones (all android phones include this feature). I use this arrangement for Pandora and Google Maps Navigation. The navigation voice comes through the car speakers at an independant volume level to that of the media volume if using an Android phone. While Pandora is playing music, Android will automatically pause Pandora if the nice navigation lady needs to tell you something. The same can be said if a phone call interrupts Pandora. The phone call can be taken on either of the two Bluetooth receivers. When taken through the MW600, your car speakers act like a speaker phone.